Adds Francesco Balestrino, referent of the project: “Given the many platforms in the Adriatic, we decided to produce hydrogen directly at sea using the existing plants, some of which are close to closure, and the pipelines that carry gas today”.
Reuse platforms
It will be necessary to see if Eni and the other companies present in the Adriatic also have other projects for the installations to be decommissioned and the idea should be compared with the mining closure plans of the ministerial offices of the Ecological Transition, but once the methane fields have been emptied, several platforms could host electrolysers between 1 and 2.5 megawatts to produce hydrogen with the current that comes from the wind and the sun.
Another five large electrolysers will be built on the ground, 20 megawatts each, in total 100 megawatts equal to the primary needs of the Municipality of Ravenna for city buses.
Possible partners
“Another portion of hydrogen could be made available to any industrial partners in the energy-intensive district of Ravenna, where there are already a refinery, a petrochemical plant, and other industries dedicated to the production of rubber and other plastic materials”, adds Balestrino of the Saipem.
If hydrogen and oxygen that make up water are separated with electricity, the oxygen obtained could be bubbled into the sea to oxygenate the Adriatic waters in association with fish farms. And one can also imagine a hydrogen distributor as a fuel open to future hydrogen cars, such as those that are starting to travel in Germany: it could convince other German tourists to go down to Romagna, sure they can fill up.